Urgent – Please help the Medway homeless

Below is a letter published in the Medway Messenger recently which both commented on the recent Rainham Central by-election and called on the Council to do more to help people faced with homelessness in Medway.

Sadly eviction is due to go ahead of the camp on Gillingham Lines tomorrow at 10 am. This camp was organised by one of our members who is asking whether anyone who is available can go along and support the five homeless people who remain in the camp.

The people who are homeless will not just go away because the camp is evicted. They deserve our support and we need to urge our Council to do more to help.

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I write on behalf of George Meegan to thank all those who voted for him in the recent Council by-election in Rainham Central, but also to push for both recently appointed and existing Medway Councillors to urgently respond to a growing local problem, that of street homelessness.

The Green Party result in the by-election held last Thursday was not as good as hoped but may reflect that, unlike other parties, we were not out vigorously campaigning in the area in the lead up to the election, a decision made, in part, because of the sad circumstances surrounding the by-election.

Unfortunately, no Councillors were present at a public meeting held earlier on the day of the count to discuss how we can best help homeless people in Medway. In fact, one local resident (one of our members) who with a few of her friends has been independently providing support and organising camps for the homeless across Medway, has written to Rainham Central Councillor and Gillingham and Rainham MP Rehman Chishti on several occasions pleading for help and is yet to even receive a response!

We are told that there is a lot of work going on on the ground with various agencies doing their best to provide and find homes but that progress is slow, particularly as there are two to three new homeless people, in Gillingham alone, every week. It is an added concern that with the new benefits cap coming in this week, there will be a lot more people in this position before Christmas, including families.

We would therefore urge all our elected Councillors to now turn their minds to providing urgent support for people who find themselves homeless and to work as vigorously at addressing this problem as they do towards winning by-elections. Local people can help by checking the “Medway Help for Homeless” Facebook page to see if they are able to donate any of the clothing, sleeping bags, quilts or camping equipment needed urgently.